Emergency kitchens in the Gaza war: the challenge of feeding 90,000 displaced people every day

How to feed hundreds of thousands of people who are fleeing with the provisions of the Israeli troops in Gaza? The figure of the neighborhood chef is essential to be able to take charge of what are known as mobile or improvised kitchen points. They are put into operation thanks to citizen collaboration in camping areas, private homes, patios, gardens or small businesses. The objective, given the fundamental and urgent need for food, is to achieve greater proximity to a population that has been hit by the war for months, malnourished, with hardly any resources and with many difficulties in going for food to areas far from the places where they drop their few belongings and set up their stall to survive.

The advance of Israeli troops in Rafah, in the south of Gaza, and the subsequent displacement of a million Gazans to other territories has greatly hindered operations, denounces during a telephone interview Rafeek el Madhoun, responsible for the Gaza Strip. American NGO Rebuilding Alliance. Faced with a greater number of displaced people, the organization has had to relocate its teams to safer areas, look for new warehouses and step on the accelerator to double the number of rations and reach the current 90,000 hot meals each day.

Until a few days before the entry of Israeli tanks into Rafah, the organization had managed to keep 15 service points open in the west of the southern city (this newspaper has not been able to confirm whether the situation remained stable after the incursion into the urban center). . “The bombs fell very close to our kitchens,” explains Mohamed Hamooda, a nutritionist and one of the kitchen heads of that NGO in Rafah, by videoconference. One of the main objectives is not to endanger the local population or the volunteers and workers, so, as far as possible, they settle in places that they consider safe.

“We go to a new camping area and check what pots and utensils they have. Then we provide them with food to cook and it is the families themselves along with those neighborhood chefs who get to work,” explains the head of the Rebuilding Alliance. “With eight large pots you can prepare 5,000 servings of rice,” he adds.

To do this, the NGO receives food from the UN World Food Program (WFP). But the arrival by land of the military to Rafah has triggered “fear and stress” among their teams, says the supervisor, which has made them remember the Israeli bombing that killed seven members in Deir al Balah on April 1. of the NGO World Central Kitchen (WCK), founded by the Spanish chef José Andrés, with which they collaborate on the ground. “That attack left us all devastated,” he acknowledges.

Madhoun laments that there is hardly any meat or chicken and that vegetables have skyrocketed in price until reaching, like potatoes, 27 shekels (about 6.5 euros) per kilo. “They are basic foods, especially for children,” he laments as he barely has access to them. Therefore, what they essentially receive these days from the UN and end up preparing on the menus are lentils, pasta, rice, vegetable oil, tomato concentrate and little else.

At least until before the entry of Israeli tanks into the center, Rafeek el Madhoun traveled to Rafah every day from Deir al Balah, in the center of the enclave, to supervise those emergency kitchens. The 90,000 meals they prepare are double what they were before the Israeli offensive in Rafah last week. “We have ordered our teams to redouble their efforts and increase our capacity to prepare hot meals in the west and north of Rafah, in the city of Khan Younis, as well as in Al Mawasi,” explains El Madhoun, referring to this last case to the large camping area to which Israel is trying to forcibly move Gazans with orders contrary to international law.

The day this interview took place, May 10, the NGO was planning to open two or three new points to be able to cook. The flow of people ascending from the south, he adds, reaches Deir al Balah. There they had just started a kitchen in a camping area with newly settled families around the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. Its objective is to ensure that the population continues to eat while they move and settle in these new settlements.

The prices to flee to areas that are considered safer have skyrocketed due to the lack of vehicles and fuel, explains Osama, a 31-year-old local journalist, from Rafah via telephone messages. He states that it is necessary to pay 300 shekels (about 75 euros) for a seat on a crowded public transport and 1,000 by car.

“Every day we have to pay more for transportation,” agrees El Madhoun, describing that logistics has been complicated due to the closure imposed by Israel of the two border crossings, the one arriving from Israeli territory, Kerem Shalom, and the one from Egypt. , next to Rafah, the only supply routes from abroad. This is a challenge because the NGO always tries to open its kitchen points in safe areas so that the inhabitants do not have to travel, but the resources they have available due to the border closure are increasingly fewer and the challenge becomes increasingly complicated. , he admits.

Follow all the international information on Facebook and xor in our weekly newsletter.

_